01:02:10 · Dmitry Zlokazov, Lenny Rachitsky
You need to validate things before you scale them. You need to think way more about the run rate of your business. So there were a lot of painful lessons for me. Since then, I also try to avoid working with hardware. I was just gonna say that. That's a [01:02:29] S1: common common challenge for startups trying to get right into hardware. Although I wouldn't be surprised now if Revolut launches something, another product, and this is this is a new product line of Revolut now that you've had that experience. [01:02:42] S0: Yeah. We launched Oh. POS terminals for acquiring. [01:02:48] S1: Alright. There we go. Dmitry, before we get to our very exciting lightning round, is there anything else that we haven't touched on that you think might be really helpful for listeners to hear, maybe a less wisdom nugget that you haven't already shared or even just something to kind of double down on that you've already shared? [01:03:04] S0: No. I think that it was an amazing chat, thanks, Lenny. We covered a lot of different topics. I would just maybe summarize that if you're excited to build certain things, never hesitate to do it. The best way to do it is probably your own startup. And it also what will give you the steepest possible learning curve. But then if you want to join a company, try to choose the one that has this highest entrepreneurial spirit and that will allow you to work as closer to a mode of a founder as you possibly can.
01:03:04 · Dmitry Zlokazov, Lenny Rachitsky
[01:03:04] S0: No. I think that it was an amazing chat, thanks, Lenny. We covered a lot of different topics. I would just maybe summarize that if you're excited to build certain things, never hesitate to do it. The best way to do it is probably your own startup. And it also what will give you the steepest possible learning curve. But then if you want to join a company, try to choose the one that has this highest entrepreneurial spirit and that will allow you to work as closer to a mode of a founder as you possibly can. [01:03:44] S1: That's a recurring theme in these conversations I'm having with companies that produce the PMs that have the steepest career trajectory. And so if... That that advice is exactly what I'm taking away from this too, assuming you want your career to accelerate really quickly after you go work at this company. Okay. Dmitry, with that, we've reached a very exciting lightning round. Are you ready? Yes. Let's go. Let's see. Here we go. Okay. First question. What are two or three books that you've recommended most to other people?
01:03:44 · Lenny Rachitsky, Dmitry Zlokazov
[01:03:44] S1: That's a recurring theme in these conversations I'm having with companies that produce the PMs that have the steepest career trajectory. And so if... That that advice is exactly what I'm taking away from this too, assuming you want your career to accelerate really quickly after you go work at this company. Okay. Dmitry, with that, we've reached a very exciting lightning round. Are you ready? Yes. Let's go. Let's see. Here we go. Okay. First question. What are two or three books that you've recommended most to other people? [01:04:15] S0: The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz. Actually, I read it quite some time ago, but I I found myself recommending it to other product managers most often. It's actually illustrative that to be a great product manager, someone needs to strive to be in a great CEO. And besides this book emphasizes the importance of building systematic solutions and scalable solutions, which is critical for scaling the company. Also, be... Being honest on how important it is to grind stuff. And then second book is... I I read it more recently, Built by Tony Fadell. I was really inspired by this one, especially given how I appreciate how it's not easy to build hardware and what what Tony was describing there. It's just it's just super exciting and and inspiring. And, also, I, you know, I think that there are different archetypes of product managers. There are people who tend to disrupt things more. Personally, I think about myself as of a builder. So Tony is a principle that he highlighted in the book. They they resonate with me a lot.
01:04:15 · Dmitry Zlokazov, Lenny Rachitsky
[01:04:15] S0: The Hard Thing About Hard Things by Ben Horowitz. Actually, I read it quite some time ago, but I I found myself recommending it to other product managers most often. It's actually illustrative that to be a great product manager, someone needs to strive to be in a great CEO. And besides this book emphasizes the importance of building systematic solutions and scalable solutions, which is critical for scaling the company. Also, be... Being honest on how important it is to grind stuff. And then second book is... I I read it more recently, Built by Tony Fadell. I was really inspired by this one, especially given how I appreciate how it's not easy to build hardware and what what Tony was describing there. It's just it's just super exciting and and inspiring. And, also, I, you know, I think that there are different archetypes of product managers. There are people who tend to disrupt things more. Personally, I think about myself as of a builder. So Tony is a principle that he highlighted in the book. They they resonate with me a lot. [01:05:44] S1: I'm trying to get Tony on the podcast. If anyone listening knows Tony Fidel and can nudge him, hey. Say yes to Lenny. That'd be great. I've been in touch with his team. He's not doing podcasts right now, but I'm trying to get him on. Okay. Moving on. Do have a favorite recent movie or TV show that you've really enjoyed?
01:05:44 · Lenny Rachitsky, Dmitry Zlokazov
[01:05:44] S1: I'm trying to get Tony on the podcast. If anyone listening knows Tony Fidel and can nudge him, hey. Say yes to Lenny. That'd be great. I've been in touch with his team. He's not doing podcasts right now, but I'm trying to get him on. Okay. Moving on. Do have a favorite recent movie or TV show that you've really enjoyed? [01:05:58] S0: I think the last movie I watched was Oppenheimer, and I really liked it. I always love watching biopics. I think they give you kind of a perspective and let you think about, you know, things in perspective. [01:06:16] S1: Is there a favorite product you recently discovered that you really love? [01:06:20] S0: Manus is a is a great thing. The AI agent. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's just like I was super impressed how I... I was mesmerized. Like, it's it's so autonomous and smooth, and I I just spent, like, a few hours the vibe coding, and I created this JavaScript app that sends me a rare English word every day to learn and remember. And it, like, it it... It's... It worked, and I was I was just amazed. [01:06:52] S1: What's what's it learned? What's a word you learned? [01:06:56] S0: Ineffable. It was the yes. [01:06:57] S1: I It was love that it's still going. That's great. Do you have a favorite life motto that you often come back to find useful in work or in life?
01:06:57 · Lenny Rachitsky, Dmitry Zlokazov
[01:06:57] S1: I It was love that it's still going. That's great. Do you have a favorite life motto that you often come back to find useful in work or in life? [01:07:07] S0: I love this phrase. I think Eisenhower said it. Plans are worthless, but planning is everything. It's it's like, you know, we we we often say how important it is to be flexible and agile and adjust to changing circumstances, but it doesn't allow us to actually not have a plan at all. It's important for us to remember that, you know, we we we always need to think many steps ahead. And while being flexible, we also need to to think things thoroughly. [01:07:43] S1: Final question. For folks that are maybe checking out Revolut for the first time, that wanna play with it already users, what's the most underrated feature? What's something that you think people should check out maybe they're not aware of? Or even just like a UX, I don't know, animation, something fun that people may not know about? [01:07:58] S0: The thing that is not yet widely used, but I really loved it, is what we call a wealth protection. So if you go to settings, you can enable a limit for any transfers outside of Revolut. And if you want to do a transfer above this limit, you will have to do a selfie check, which is our proprietary technology. We do a video selfie that allows us to make sure that it's you. No one else is doing the transfer. And, essentially, it's almost as smooth as face ID, and the way team built it is is really great. I was... I'm really proud of those guys.